Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Still Learning

I found out something very interesting about my cherry. I've known for decades, that the higher the lattitude that it's harvested from, the denser the wood, the better the grain quality, and the lower the sap content. Cherry from like New York State has nearly no sap at all. When I started looking for cabinet shops that might be interested in the wood (there are no boatbuilders around here), I learned that the bottom has fallen out of the cherry market. The reason is the rain forests in South American are being clear cut. The cherry they find is very sappy and soft, but it's imported into the U.S. where buyers, especially those looking to ressale versus buying for their own use, are going for price rather than quality. Good cherry that used to go for $8-11/bd.ft. is now going for $3.60--4.00/bd.ft. for the cheap rain forest stuff, and that's for kiln dried rather than air dried wood. That's the same price cherry used to go for forty years ago. This is really sad, even if you don't mention that this clear-cutting practice is subsidizing a market that is killing the environment.